


vicissitudes

by turtlenecksandsweaters



Series: flowers of emerald [2]
Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Platonic Relationships, War of the Last Alliance, i also just wanted to write glorestor meeting during the war ykno, their friendship isnt appreciated enough so
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-22
Updated: 2019-05-22
Packaged: 2020-03-09 17:50:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18922036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/turtlenecksandsweaters/pseuds/turtlenecksandsweaters
Summary: Running his hands through dampened hair, Erestor sighs at the foreign feeling. It’s not a comfortable one, not at all, but he supposes it’s fine.(But really, he’s not comfortable with it at all, he actually liked his hair and he knows Elrond knows too—)





	vicissitudes

“Is it salvageable?”

 

The room is dull, lit only by the candles placed meticulously around the room for optimal visage. Erestor sits in a chair taken from the small breakfast table currently to his left, hands in his lap as Elrond shifts behind him, his perfect fingers combing through the scout’s uneven hair. There's a frown on his face even when he drops his hands to his side and walks around Erestor to get a drink. Erestor quietly refuses his offer for one as well.

 

Elrond swallows, but he does not know what for it surely was not that water. “I’m afraid not. You..cut it  _ really  _ short,” he doesn’t laugh so much as he exhales sharply, but a small smile creeps onto Erestor’s face anyways: the actuality of a rarely genuine one.

 

“Then we’ll cut the rest and let it grow back,” Elrond looks at him like he's just sputtered blasphemy, but quickly smiles back anyways at the jovial grin on his friend’s lips.

 

“That, we can do,” he turns around and after some rummaging through his day bag, he pulls out what Erestor already knows to be his sharpened fruit knife. Elrond shrugs, and he rolls his eyes. Being on the move continuously proved for some interesting choices. He (Erestor — idiot as he was) would have insisted they use the same knife he initially cut the chunk of his hair off with, if he  _ hadn’t _ lost it in the rush he had been in. Oh well.

 

It doesn’t take long to cut the rest of his hair into a similar length, awry as it is it looks better than it had when only the nape of it was half way down his neck.

 

Running his hands through dampened hair, Erestor sighs at the foreign feeling. It’s not a comfortable one, not at all, but he supposes it’s fine.

 

(But really, he’s not comfortable with it at all, he actually  _ liked  _ his hair and he knows Elrond knows too—)

 

“It’s strange but..I think it fits you,” Elrond smiles, pulling out his own chair to finally sit across from Erestor and dropping the knife onto the table. “Silly as it is, this reminds me of when Elros first asked me to cut his hair.”

 

Erestor bares a melancholic smile, remembering the brief time he had known the brothers when he was younger.

 

(Mindlessly, Erestor watches Elrond lean away for a thick ribbon, eyes retracing their untaken steps down to his other hand and finds that his lord had, instead of letting his useless hair fall to the floor, collected it. It is not by any mean strange, hair often was valued, though Elrond seems vehemently  _ worried  _ about it more than a friend should be in normal circumstances.)

 

(Erestor takes the tied handful when it is offered back to him.)

 

“Thank you for helping me with this, my friend,” little more than a decade ago and Erestor would still be calling Elrond his lord. And although he still is  _ his Lord,  _ they’re friends, and Elrond insists on being referred to as such.

 

Smiling, he nods, swishing the metal cup in his hand he allows a thick silence to stir around them but never between them. “Are you sure you’re alright?” His shoulders match his tone; friendly and stubborn and strong. Erestor admires the strong mien.

 

Erestor’s eyes leave the candle he had been watching courageously flicker at the other end of the tent, holding up its own corner of the room feebly for such a small thing. “I’m fine. To be honest, these recent events have not quite registered in my mind yet—” abruptly he chuckles, attempting to brush off the topic though he knows Elrond will not drop it so easily.

 

Elrond, rightfully so, stares at him suspiciously. Like moments before his disposition is calm and friendly, but his eyes have taken a sharper, stricter shape. Erestor fights the urge to look away.

 

(His lord could be very intimidating when he so chose to.)

 

Humming, Elrond sets down his cup and leans forward; towards him. “You are my friend Erestor, so I’ll say this to you— as a friend,” commanding all the attention in the room, crystal blue and leafy green orbs meet in a silent debate, “don’t be an ignoramus halfwit. Be conscious of what you can and  _ cannot  _ handle.”

 

Erestor’s lips part to speak, but is cut off by Elrond’s iron  _ plea _ . Even being many centuries older than the warlord before him did not stop Erestor from feeling like a child being chastised. He’s not entirely sure that  _ isn’t  _ the effect Elrond is intending.

 

Sighing, he smiles, ”Usually I am the one lecturing  _ you _ .”

 

Elrond doesn’t laugh back at him like he had been expecting, like he had been  _ hoping _ for.

 

The silence returns harsher this time than before, only now does Erestor understand how seriously Elrond is taking this. Long minutes pass before finally Erestor decides it is time for him to depart. He stands with a bow, replacing the empty spot by the table with the chair he had momentarily stolen and leaves for the entrance. “You could have died, Erestor. Realize that.”

 

Only for a moment does he stop in front of the tent flap before leaving swiftly.

.

.

.

Less than a week later a hero of legendary proportions arrives at Gil-Galad’s camp from the west.

 

Erestor had been gone again when news of the hero arrived in an urgent letter along with other important news — when he comes back he insists he came as  _ soon _ as he could, but that isn’t entirely true. It’s just after daybreak a fortnight after receiving the letter when he finally enters camp and dismounts his horse upon arrival, a mare larger than himself starkly similar in some stupidly meretricious way. His hood is pulled all the way up, far enough to just cover his eyes, so he doesn’t notice the new light to the camp — the only thing different he could reflect on (if he so thought to in the future) would be that the man who took his reigns from him was  _ smiling  _ at him.

 

He turns around and walks head first into an armored chest and let’s out an unseemly  _ squawk _ .

 

Feeling some part of himself hidden deep wither and die after going through all the stages of grief in seconds, Erestor backs away from his unlikely encounter farther than was probably polite and looks up to gauge who he had so graciously run into. He’s met with oceanic blue eyes set in olive sockets, framed by hair that looks like the sun that he’s sure staring directly at it in late afternoon might blind you. The elf is taller than Erestor, although that itself is not really an achievement, what  _ is _ an achievement is that he stands almost as tall as the overhang of the (man-made) stables.

 

(On second thought, perhaps that human was not smiling at Erestor.)

 

Erestor doesn’t hear the words said from behind him — identifiably the stable boy, but they’re not directed at him, though he does catch a vibrant  _ ‘Lord Glorfindel!’  _ before the blonde in front of him raises his head from Erestor to the other in acknowledgment of the name.

 

_ Oh.  _ Of course this was Erestor’s luck.

 

The golden lord says something that Erestor ignores (it doesn’t involve him, outside of enemy territory the conversations of the army did not usually concern him) and takes a step past the scout. Shoulders deflating in relief, the hooded elf takes off in the direction of the High King’s tent.

 

A few yards from the stables when he thinks no one will bother him, heavy footfalls reach his ears, and to his chagrin the embodiment of the sun falls into pace beside him. Erestor groans but the golden messiah appears to ignore it, or just doesn’t hear it — though he doubts the second knowing just whose presence he is in.

 

“From what I remember it would be polite to introduce yourself,” the lambent voice that belongs to the lord is easily attributed to him but surprising nonetheless. Lifting his head up, Erestor looks at the tan elf beneath black cloth and thick lashes.

 

“Is that so? Had I known you’d be  _ following  _ me, I might have felt more inclined to earlier,” truthfully, he did not mean to snap back, but his ride here had been laboriously boring — he did not intend to spend his moments before council talking to the undead. (No matter how appealing the prospect of such conversation might seem.)

 

Glorfindel hums, and the raven haired spy almost feels  _ bad _ . Rolling his eyes where no one can see, he snaps his head forward and recites an age old lie; “I serve as one of the High King’s councilors, Erestor.”

 

He hums again and Erestor decides he doesn’t like it when he does that. 

 

“You don’t look like a councilor, but alright,” he smiles and shrugs, “I am Glorfindel of Gondolin.”

 

Briefly wondering why he does not mention being the ‘Lord of the Golden Flower’, Erestor reminds himself it doesn’t matter when the house hasn’t stood for an age. “I know,” is the immediately croaked response.

 

The rest of their short journey continues with little talk and long strides (the later prompted by Erestor solely — his “companion” proved to be in no hurry). With the guards stationed at the entrance of the King’s tent just in sight, Erestor takes a sharp left, irritating at yet another confused humm Glorfindel lets out. 

 

“Where  _ are  _ you going?” 

 

“I need to drop something off first,” smiling slyly, Erestor’s pace quickens but Glorfindel keeps up anyways.

 

Only then does Glorfindel really take in the silhouette of the interesting ( _ new! _ ) elf he was, admittedly, kind of following around like a lost dog. Through all the dark cloth and intense fabric is a smothered red, hinting at whatever this councilor chose to wear under this distasteful get-up, and upon his back what looks like just a normal stick is wrapped in the same black material as his hood. The pole is thin and inconspicuous, yet he wonders how he overlooked it so easily and resolves that maybe that was a good thing — for Erestor. With the obtrusive hood covering his face, only his nose and mouth are exposed; even his hands are hidden from the light.

 

(If Glorfindel got the chance, he could have just barely met Erestor’s shaded eyes but the option does not come that day.)

 

(It comes two months later in the dead of night and he does not even realize at the time that it is Erestor. The elf he passes while leaving Elrond’s quarters is the embodiment of night and would blend in with the stars and sky. Glorfindel did not like the blackness of his eyes or the kohl surrounding them.)

 

Glorfindel only stops his surmising when Erestor halts him in front of a large and dark tent, beginning to remove the pole on his back and then, remembering finally of Glorfindel’s presence, turns around.

 

“Seeing as you too are heading for the King’s quarters, please alarm him that one of his councillors may be arriving a little late,” he smiles a barbaric and familiar grin, leaving Glorfindel  _ winded _ when he finally turns into the tent without another word.

 

Sucking in the last air left between them, the golden lord looks away from the tent, leaving storm clouds where emerald flowers once were.   
  


**Author's Note:**

> i was meant to post this in april but,, i am a very slow writer and i have so many wips it’s unbelievable. anyways ive been working on this one for a while and im actually pretty happy with it. btw, erestor is a scout for gil-galad and one of his and elrond’s close friends. he’s not actually a councilor yet.


End file.
